Current Chief Constable wants to modernise force

In an exclusive interview with Teesside Live in June, new Chief Constable Mike Veale said he wanted to completely mordernise the force - but warned the public they must “manage their expectations” of what the police can do.

He conceded morale was low but wants to reinvigorate officers and staff - and respond more smartly to online and other crimes.

He said he would cut a layer of management to get more front-line officers out on the street, and give them better equipment to get them out of police stations.

Career burglar found hiding in an attic

'Providers have to do more' on online crime

He said: “We have got a small cyber crime team here, and they work with neighbouring forces in the serious and organised crime unit so we are doing quite a bit of work around cyber crime.

“It’s a growing problem here and nationally. I think it’s something that Government needs to look at more significantly.

“The commercial operators, the providers, and I think they’ve got a responsibility to come to the table and make their contribution.”

14:57KEY EVENT

'Not having enough officers to send out is very frustrating'

Jules is asked about morale - which the Police Federation says is at an all-time low - if it’s frustrating to take up to 1,200 calls in a shift but not have the resources to deal with everything.

She said: “It is very frustrating. When you are dispatching and you have a big job queue and you obviously wants to get to the victims of crime, but there’s not enough police officers out there. They’re dealing from emergency to emergency and there are some people waiting a long time to be dealt with and it can be very frustrating.”

Jules Cowie

14:51Mike Brown

House fires, robberies and a stabbing in one night shift

Sky’s cameras have been at Cleveland Police’s new Hemlington HQ since 6am where more than 360 calls were taken between midnight and 6am.

Speaking at the end of the night shift, call-dispatcher Jules Cowie said: “We have had an extremely busy night. We’ve had things from a house fire, we’ve had attempted robberies, we’ve had a stabbing and quite a few missing from home reports which takes time and resources.”

She said night shifts are busy - but day shifts are usually much busier.

Things can be challenging speaking to witnesses or victims of crime - that must be quite upsetting at times?

Jules continued: “Oh definitely yes. Some of the calls are challenging. But we get good training, we know what we’re doing, and we know how to keep the call under control and get officers there as quickly as we can.”

14:39Mike Brown

Why Cleveland Police are taking part

Assistant chief constable Jason Harwin (Image: Katie Lunn)

Assistant Chief Constable Jason Harwin gave Teesside Live the following statement.

“Being offered the opportunity to have Sky News with us for a day ensures that the public can see what our officers and staff have to deal with on a daily basis. It means we can show everything from the calls that we’re dealing with to the response to those incidents by officers on the ground and it highlights the demand placed on us as a police service, on a national level.”

14:36KEY EVENT

"The public aren't daft" - Barry Coppinger

Results of a Sky survey are relayed to Cleveland’s Police and Crime Commissioner Barry Coppinger, which found that 83% of people feel crime has gone up and 86% believe the police are under-funded to deal with the rise.

He said: “Yes, the public aren’t daft and they’ve worked out exactly what you’ve just said.

“If you think about the Cleveland area which is about 10 miles north to south about 15 miles east to west, you’ve identified this morning nearly 500 crimes that have been reported.

“That’s a lot of crime in a very small and compact area.”

“We’re facing a sort of perfect storm in policing in that more and more funding has been top-sliced out of the national budgets to fund national initiatives there is less resources left. What’s left is not being distributed fairly.

“So areas like Cleveland and other urban areas where crime is increasing more substantially are not getting their fair share.